Leaving Footprints
by all-shattered-ones
Summary: I open my sack and take out the package. Four dairies and a letter. My fingers run across the covers. It's like they're screaming to me to be opened, begging for me to relive the passages. But I don't have to read them to know what they say, I know my father's words practically by heart. They echo through my head, saying it's my duty to keep the new avatar from making his mistake.


**This story is set centuries before the Hundred Year War and about a young airbender girl. For more information, please read story.**

* * *

It's been a while since the ship moored and all of the sailors have gone off to roam the harbour of the Northern Water Tribe. I'm still on deck, gazing at the frozen city.

'I thought you couldn't wait to get to the Northern Water Tribe?' Captain Kuno appears next to me and copies my leaning on the middle-high railing. His wrinkled fingers rotate the silver ring around his thumb, in it is engraved the symbol of the water tribe. He looks at me with his blue eyes narrowed. 'Where has your eagerness gone Gami?'

I look back at the panorama, as an indication. 'I've never seen anything like it.'

'Of course,' he says and from the way he speaks I can tell he's smiling.

For a while we stare in silence. 'Thanks for letting me on the ship,' I finally say. I open the leather sack that I wore cross-body, hoping to find some money to pay for my seafaring.

Kuno raises both hands and shakes his head. 'You have not at all been a bother. Brought your own food, never impeding the sailors. I really don't see why you should pay me.'

'Are you sure?'

'Absolutely. We from the Water Tribe honour our guests greatly. I want to set a good example don't I?'

'Well in that case,' I say as I close my bag. 'Good thing. I didn't have that much anyway.'

'How much do you have? I suppose you'll buy yourself a good coat?'

'This one's fine.' I pull the orange shawl closer around me.

'Fine for Western Air Temple winters. The poles are quite something else.' He stared at me and I didn't really know what he expects me to say.

'I'll be fine.'

Captain Kuno sighted and smiled weakly at his city. 'Even a young girl like you will be okay in a place as welcoming as this. Too bad I can't bear to stay in one place for longer than a day.' He awkwardly pets my head but I smile anyway. 'Now go find your avatar.'

'Won't be a problem.' I say while mirroring his bittersweet expression. I feel my back to check whether my glider is still in place. Then I give Kuno a hug. 'Goodbye captain.'

'Goodbye Gami,' he says.

Then I walk down the gangway and don't look back.

* * *

Kuno was right, I have to admit. The first thing I find myself doing is buying something to keep me warm. It was hard finding something not made of fur but I couldn't go against my principle. Eventually I leave a small shop with a woollen poncho and matching gloves. In white rather than the usual blue so I don't feel like an intruder.

What I like so much about the people from the Water Tribe is that they enjoy company just like I do. People generally stick to themselves and mind their own business but when I smile to someone as a way to greet them, smiles are returned. This makes me feel a bit at home.

I know that I am here for a purpose but the streets allure me to get lost in them. I climb stairs after stairs, turn corners after corners and pass bridge after bridge until I find one where I can sit on the parapet.

I open my sack and take out the package. Four dairies and a letter, all of them tied together by a leather strap. None of the dairies are too heavy. I have sorted them in the right order. Silver, blue, green, red. Air, water, earth, fire. My fingers run across the covers. It's like they're screaming to me to be opened, begging for me to relive the passages.

I put the package back in the sack. I don't have to read them to know what they say, I know my father's words practically by heart. They echo through my head, saying it's my duty to keep the new avatar from making his mistake.

I look down at my feet. Small boats pass underneath them, steered by young waterbenders. Most of them ignore me or look at me concerned as they passed underneath me. Though one addresses me. He stopped his passenger-free boat.

'I wouldn't sit there if I were you,' he says.

'Why?'

He raises his eyebrows. 'Ice is slippery.'

'I can swim.'

He laughs. There's a resonance of his high, premature voice. 'Do you even know how cold these waters are?

I shrug. 'I'll better not fall then.'

He gives up and prepares to depart, raising his arms.

'Wait,' I say. The boy retakes his normal position and looks at me in an questioning way. 'Do you know where I can find the avatar?'

'The avatar?' I nod. He thinks for a while, looking past me to the higher part of the city. 'He's probably at the palace, preparing to go to the Earth Kingdom. It's not the best timing to try to visit him now, I think he's leaving soon.'

'Do you think I can speak to him?'

Again he laughs, and even though now more of a chuckle, again I hear the echoes. 'No way they let you speak to him now, unless the chief knows you or something.' From the way I look disappointedly at the water he can conclude I don't. 'Maybe you can try his parents or,' he thinks of ways to help me, 'his old waterbending teacher. Thinks his name's Satone.'

'Do you know where he lives?'

'Not far below the palace. I can bring you there for two coins.'

I shook my head. 'I don't have any money with me. But it's okay.'

He considered it for a while, sighted.

'It's okay if you just tell me where it is.'

'Yes, sorry, I can't waste my time. You'll have to walk. As long as you go up you're going the right way. When you're stopped by guards you've gone too far. Just ask where master Satone lives. It's quite a walk though. I hope you don't mind roaming these streets at night.'

I pull the strings on my back securing my glider. 'I'm faster than you'd think with tail winds,' I say smiling before I stand up and turn around. I jump up in the thin air and let the winds push me forward. People become ants, houses become dice. But still the boy's laugh echoes through the streets.


End file.
